Stormlord rising s-2 Read online

  Ryka gave a weary smile and obliged. The woman snorted as she looked about her. "So this is one of their precious dunes, eh? Just looks like a heap of red sand to me. Is this where he lives? Ouch, but my backside hurts. All the muscles is scrunched up." She rubbed her buttocks, wincing. "They'll be after me to cook in a moment, too."

  Ryka envied Junial one thing: she was not molested by the Reduners, possibly because she was old enough to be unattractive to them, or perhaps because no one wanted to upset a good cook.

  "There are settlements on many of the dunes, including this one," Ryka told her. "But we are going to the one Sandmaster Davim rules, Dune Watergatherer. We have to cross a number of dunes to get there, I believe."

  "Thought he ruled the lot of them?"

  "Sort of-except wherever the rebels are. Vara Redmane and her followers. Dune Watergatherer is where Davim started, and it's where he lives now, as far as I know. Each dune has its own sandmaster, although nowadays they all bow to Davim."

  "So how do they build cities on a heap of sand?"

  "They don't. They live in tents, and move the encampments from time to time. There are several tribes on each dune, all owing allegiance to the same dune sandmaster. So Kher Ravard heads his own tribe, but he lives on the same dune as Sandmaster Davim."

  The older woman sighed. "Don't tell me, more lying on the ground instead of a proper bed. No tables, no chairs neither, I'll wager. I'm too old for this. And all because I cook a good loaf of bab bread. How's that for fate playing its sandblasted tricks on a widow woman?" She gazed up at the slope of the dune. The sand was patterned with lines of creeping plant life, runnels flowing forth in random designs. "Pretty enough, I suppose. But where are the tunnels bringing water? We've seen none of them shafts since we left Qanatend."

  "No tunnels were ever built here. I was told once the Reduners regard each dune as sacred to a dune god, and not to be defiled by deep digging-or by any permanent building for that matter. Besides, the dune moves. Difficult to build anything permanent."

  "Then however do they get their water?"

  "A stormlord can make it rain on the slopes of each dune near the waterholes. The most difficult of all the cloudbreaks, I believe, and only possible because each camp is only a few hundred people, so they don't need much water."

  Junial looked at her curiously. "How do you know all this stuff? There's more to you than meets the eye, seems to me!"

  Ryka hedged. "I was a scholar once." She paused, then added quietly, "I suppose that has gone, along with the rest of my life."

  Junial grimaced in sympathy. "I'm sorry. At least I'm not young enough for the men to want to climb under my shift. But y'know, you did get the best of the bunch, m'dear. Whose is the bread rising in the basket? His?"

  "The bread-? Oh. My baby. Blighted eyes, he's not the Kher's! He's my husband's." She touched her abdomen. "It really is obvious now, isn't it?"

  "It is that. How far along are you? More than halfway, by the looks."

  They were interrupted by a guard yelling at Junial. "Time cook!" he told her. "Work!"

  Junial shrugged and trudged off to where the guards and slaves were starting the cooking fires.

  Ryka lingered a moment to watch the changing shadows as the sun slid below the horizon. Dark blood-red shadows accentuated the dips and hollows. The dying light blazed on the ridges until they glowed as if lit from within. It's not pretty, she thought. Pretty is for sweet frilly stuff. This is stark, harsh, dangerous.

  But she couldn't help adding, and magnificent.

  Even as she watched, the dune groaned, a deep moaning sound reverberating deep in the sand like a note plucked from the bass string of a giant lute.

  "The dune god speaks," one of the Reduners said in his own tongue, and thumped his fist to his chest in reverent acknowledgment. As they were eating, six men mounted on individual myriapede hacks appeared on the horizon. Ryka felt them before she saw them. In the gloaming, they were no more than silhouettes against a deep purple sky, hard to see, but having sensed their water she knew where to look. Quickly she glanced away, not wanting Ravard, seated next to her on the matting and cushions by the fire, to realize her water sensitivity.

  A few moments later he must have felt them himself because he stood hurriedly and called to his senior bladesmen, who sprang to their feet in instant obedience. They strode away from the camp, fully armed with scimitars, zigger cages and zigtubes. Ryka scrambled to her feet to see better; so did Kaneth, who had been sitting with the rest of the slaves.

  Ravard doesn't trust the Pebblered folk, she thought. They bow to Davim and his heir, but once they were subject to no one. I wonder if they hate the tribes of Dune Watergatherer as much as we do.

  Kaneth threaded his way through the slaves to stand at her shoulder as she watched. "Ravard sent word to the closest Pebblered tribe that we were here," he murmured in her ear. "You cannot cross an inhabited dune without the permission of one of the tribes living on it. Of course they are far too frightened to stop Kher Ravard and his men, but apparently he observes the courtesies and pauses to ask."

  She did not turn to acknowledge his presence. "How do you know that?" she whispered, hoping to prompt his memories. At least he sounded more rational now.

  "I don't know. I remember the oddest things, without any recollection of where I learned them."

  "But you still don't remember who you are?"

  "No. Why don't you tell me more about who I am?"

  "No. A little knowledge is dangerous. It is better you discover it for yourself. If they find out who you are-" She made a gesture toward the waiting men. "You would die before you drew another breath. You must be careful."

  "I find it hard to think I was ever so dangerous to them."

  "Believe me, you were. And you had better hope no one ever recognizes you."

  Kaneth gave a lopsided grin and tapped at the scabbing on his face. "I doubt I look the way I used to." In the dry air the scar was forming well, but his skin was puckering, drawing his face into a travesty of the handsome man she had known. Her breath caught, snagged on her desire to touch his cheek, to say how sorry she was. To tell him it didn't matter to her. She wanted him to assuage the ache in her heart by touching her in turn, but knew he would not. When he looked at her it was with a neutral interest, not desire, not friendship, not love.

  Oh, Sunlord, how can I bear this?

  "You're a slave," she said. "Doesn't that enrage you? We are all slaves, to be used as our masters see fit. Women and boys to be raped, children taken from their families. There was a time when that would have roused you to a raging passion."

  He ran a hand over his head in a troubled gesture. His hair was beginning to grow back in a short fuzz. Once it had been long and golden, shining and luxuriant. She had liked to run her hand through it. She pushed the thought away.

  "I-I don't know. I feel as if I'm walking within the wavering mists of a sand-dancer mirage. Nothing is real around me. There are voices speaking to me, but from so far away in the past I can barely hear the words. I catch glimpses-of people, of places-but I don't know who they are, where they are, or what they meant-mean-to me. When I try to catch hold of the images they dance away and my head throbs with pain. And inside me there is an emptiness that once was full, a hole of nothingness I don't know how to replenish."

  Hope disintegrated, spilling out of her in tiny pieces, each one hurting. "Can't you-can't you remember anything?"

  "Silly stuff-playing, squabbling with other children. Nothing important. And there are things I feel to be true from my adulthood. I know if I picked up a sword it would feel right in my hand, as if it belonged." He glanced away toward the dune. "I know I have been to the Red Quarter before. That I have ridden a pede across the sands. That I have a smattering of their tongue because I have mixed with them before. That there was a time when they were no enemies of mine." He looked back at her. "I know I have held a woman in my arms and loved."

  Her heart pounded as if she ha
d been running. "But you don't recall who?"

  He shook his head. "I suppose I'd know her if I saw her. I have no memory of her face, or her voice. Just of the way I felt about someone. And sometimes I think there was as much grief there as happiness."

  His words seared more than they comforted, reminding her of all they had lost. She swallowed away the pain.

  She cast a glance about them to make sure no one was listening. Ravard and the Pebblered men were still talking, far enough away to be almost invisible in the darkness, as well as inaudible. In the camp itself, the only light was from the fire and there was not much of that. There was no one close enough to hear anything she or Kaneth said and no one even looking at them. The Reduners were passing around some skins of amber; some were singing-the noise level had risen.

  "What do you remember playing with when you were little?" she asked, unable to resist the urge to prompt his memory, like a child who couldn't stop picking at a scab.

  "Water," he said promptly, without apparent thought. Then repeated the word in astonishment, as if the memory had suddenly returned. "Water! Sunlord help me! I could once move water."

  She hushed him with a finger to her lips.

  He stared at her, shocked. "That's why you think I am in danger! I was a water sensitive!"

  She smothered her joy at the fragment of returning memory. "They must not know."

  "I don't remember-" He rubbed his forehead. "Withering spit. I remember moving water. I was a rainlord."

  She nodded. "You are still a rainlord."

  He considered that, his frown deepening. Then, "No. No. I'm not. Not anymore. There's nothing there. Nothing."

  And he stumbled away into the darkness. She stared after him, appalled. It couldn't be true, surely. She wanted to follow, but it was too risky and she dared not, no matter how much her heart ached for him. The next morning, the pedes climbed the dune in single file, their pointed feet angled backward to give them purchase on the shifting sand of the incline. Once again Ryka was seated behind Ravard, his proximity a reminder of the way he came to her each night, his gaze alight with anticipation. His desire to please her with his lovemaking was oddly touching, the naivety with which he tried to achieve her pleasure was both exasperating and in different circumstances might even have been endearing-yet the joy he took from the slightest of her smiles both puzzled and alarmed her. Nonetheless, as she rode behind him, seated cross-legged on the embroidered saddle cushion, any kindness she felt toward him was overridden by an abiding hatred of his assumptions, the assumptions of a conqueror.

  I'm a slave, she thought. I have no right to say no-and therefore this is rape, for all it is an agreement I entered into to keep my son safe.

  She glared at his back. One day I shall kill him for it. Yet when she thought of driving a blade into him, what she felt most was not triumph, but regret that it would be necessary.

  Sand hells-why does everything have to be so complicated?

  When they reached the outskirts of the Pebblered encampment, they halted. Some of the tribal elders, plus a number of Scarpen and Gibber slaves, were waiting for them in the cool of the morning. Ravard had apparently promised the tribe some of the water from Qanatend.

  While the slaves hoisted the large family jars out of the panniers and carried them into the camp, Ryka stayed where she was, seated on the pede. Ravard stood a couple of paces away, holding the reins and chatting with the tribemaster, an elderly man, portly and unattractive and, to Ryka's eyes, obsequiously fawning.

  The fellow is terrified of upsetting the Master Son, she thought. Ravard may be young, but the men of other dunes fear him the way men fear Sandmaster Davim. I wonder if it is Ravard's reputation making them so scared, or simply because he is the sandmaster's heir?

  She shot a look at Kaneth where he sat alone on the slaves' packpede. The other male slaves had been unroped so that they could help carry the water; he had simply ignored the order. Bravado? Foolhardiness? That weird innocence he seemed to have now? She didn't know. Oh, Kaneth, please get better soon. I am scared, too, and so alone…

  From the back of her mount, she glanced across to where the slaves, both the ones from the caravan and those from the encampment, were working together to unload the packpedes. Each water jar was tightly sealed with bab gum to stop spillage or evaporation. Scarpen water, she thought, her bitterness so raw she could taste it on her tongue. And how many will die because it was stolen?

  Elmar was there, and several others including the slave who had threatened to kill Ravard if he had the chance. What was his name? Whetstone, that was it. A Scarpen artisan with enough rage inside him to make him a poor choice for enslavement. Even now, he sent periodic scowls in the direction of Ravard and the Pebblered tribemaster.

  The sand-brained fool, Ryka thought. Sooner or later someone is going to notice and decide he's more trouble than he's worth.

  She watched as Elmar and another man climbed onto a pede to extract a jar from the pannier and hand it down to Whetstone. The jar caught on a piece of bab-fibre rope used to secure the pannier to the pede and they could not unhook it. Whetstone reached up to help, but the cord had pulled tight and he couldn't budge it, either. The guard, seeing their predicament, stepped forward, sliding his scimitar out of his scabbard to cut the cord.

  Ryka's mouth went dry as she saw Whetstone change. His slouch tautened. His scowl dissolved into an avid hunger. Oh, blast, she thought. He wouldn't. She sent a frantic look in Kaneth's direction, more out of habit than conscious thought. She jerked her head to indicate what had caught her attention, and he turned his head to look.

  The cord cut, the Reduner guard prepared to put his weapon back into its scabbard. His grip, loose and casual, was no match for Whetstone's powerful wrenching grab. Before the guard had fully realized what had happened, Whetstone had leaped away. His face was a portrait of blind rage as he raised the scimitar over his head in a double-fisted hold, his teeth bared in an animal-like snarl. He raced toward Ravard, the blade poised for a savage downward slash. Kaneth scrambled up to stand on the back of his pede.

  Ryka's thoughts were lucid and fast. Whetstone wants Ravard dead. I could stop this. She could jump on the man as he passed between Kaneth's pede and hers. She could save Ravard's life.

  But why should I? This was their chance. She had a pede loaded with food and water under her, Kaneth was right next to her, Elmar nearby, and none of them was tied.

  In the confusion we ride out of here-Even as the thoughts tumbled through her head, she acted.

  She stood up. As she straightened, she beckoned to Elmar. Her heart was beating wildly. He gave a pikeman's salute, telling her he understood, then he leaped from the packpede and raced-not toward her, but toward Kaneth's pede. Exactly as she had hoped he would.

  At the same moment, the guard who had lost his weapon gave a belated screech of warning and took off after Whetstone. Ravard heard and began to turn, his hand dropping the reins to reach for the hilt of his scimitar. He would be too late to save himself, Ryka saw that much. She took a step toward the driver's seat on the first segment and bent to grab the reins where they looped across the saddle.

  And the world shifted. An eerie sound throbbed into the air from beneath the dune, like the echoing beat of a drummer in an underground cavern.

  The legs of Ryka's mount sank into the sand along one side. She panicked, the terror of the incomprehensible overwhelming her as the animal tilted. In startled shock the pede reared its head, its mouthparts clicking and sawing its alarm. She lost her balance and began to topple. She flung out a hand to grab the pede's segment handle and missed. As she fell, the scene she glimpsed etched itself onto her memory.

  Elmar, arms pumping, raced toward them in answer to her call. In front of him, one of Whetstone's feet sank into the sand as if it was water. He went flying, to sprawl headlong a pace away from Ravard. The scimitar flew from his hand in an arc. Ravard and the Pebblered tribemaster both tumbled to their knees, the ground unstable benea
th their feet.

  In the background, the throbbing sound changed to a higher tremolo, hauntingly beautiful, spine-tinglingly eldritch. Through it all, Kaneth stood on the back of the packpede alongside her, his expression stark and intense, yet devoid of fear, as the reddish slanting rays of the rising sun captured him in a glowing halo of light. He looked godlike, resembling images she had seen painted on temple walls.

  And then she hit the ground. The breath in her lungs exploded from her. Pain lanced through her torso. She screamed silently, The baby! She gasped for air, torturously dragged it into emptied lungs. And all the while the sand beneath her slipped and slid like unstrung beads and the strange unearthly song issued forth from the depths of the dune. When coherence returned, Kaneth was kneeling at her side, touching her face, begging her to say something. The ground beneath her still moved, gently now as trickles of sand flowed this way and that. A small fountain of sand grains inexplicably burst forth next to her shins to shower her legs.

  Nearby, the Pebblered tribemaster was hauling himself upright and Ravard was struggling to rise. He was buried up to his knees. When he finally pulled himself free, he lurched across the still rippling ground to the man who had tried to kill him.

  Whetstone, on his knees, had lost the scimitar, and was groping blindly around in the sand for it. Ravard drew his weapon, his intention clear. Ryka wanted to move, but pain and fear of more pain kept her immobile.

  Kaneth looked up from where he crouched beside Ryka, and said, "No." The single word was commanding, spoken with an authority he did not have, not here. It stopped Ravard, that voice. It stopped the sands too, or so it appeared, for they ceased moving the moment he spoke, and the song from deep in the earth fell silent.

  You're sandcrazy, Ryka told Kaneth, but her words must have only been in her head, because she didn't hear them.

  Whetstone was still on his knees, his rage deflated. "Lord! Lord Uthardim," he cried. "The Kher killed my family. My parents, my brothers. I want justice. Kill him. Kill this murdering redman."